Chapter 919： East Africa's land area and administrative divisions

Chapter 919 East Africa’s land area and administrative regions

Administrative division adjustment is obviously not done overnight, but involves the game between all parties. After all, it involves the allocation of resources. The most typical ones are education, medical and other livelihood projects. Especially under this system in East Africa, only provincial administrative regions can enjoy it. Upgrade related resources.

In November 1896, the East African government released a general plan for the adjustment of the administrative divisions of East Africa.

“Based on comprehensive data considerations from all regions across the country, we intend to divide the country into 45 provincial administrative regions, including Lanfang Overseas Province and two new provinces established on the island of Madagascar, but excluding overseas colonies.”

“There is also a special area, which is the Congo rainforest area. Because of its climate characteristics, we plan to continue to retain its role as a protected area, and the administrative level is the same as the provincial level.”

"And because of the Rhine City, we are planning to cancel the original Central Province and separate part of the land from the Hohenzollern Province, Swabia and Salzburg Provinces as the new Central Province. In this way, in the future The Central Province is truly located in the center of East Africa geographically. As for the former Central Province, the title of Coastal Province was restored. "

Coastal Province is now the Central Province and the area where the first town and city is located. In the early days of East Africa, it was one of the three coastal regions. At that time, the administrative divisions of East Africa were still based on large regions.

“In the Mozambique region, we will set up five new provinces: Tete, Nyasaland, Zambezi, Rhodesia, and Plains, with the cities of Tete, Nacala, and Quelimane , Beira City, and Xinxiang City as the provincial capital.”

The name Nyasaland is naturally another name for Lake Malawi in its previous life. Similarly, Rhodesia is the name of Zimbabwe and other places in its previous life, which was retained by Ernst.

As for Pingyuan Province, it is completely Ernst’s bad taste. Xinxiang City, the capital of Pingyuan Province, is actually the town of Saukui in the former Portuguese colony.

After all, there are too few plains in East Africa, and the best farming conditions are concentrated in southern Mozambique. Therefore, Ernst’s naming of this place as Pingyuan Province is worthy of its name, and the capital of Pingyuan Province naturally has to be named after Xinxiang. This can also Get rid of the Portuguese colonial name Sauquet.

Plains Province is also equipped with a port, that is, Inhambane City in Mozambique in its previous life. In this way, although Xinxiang City is inland, it does not have no outlet to the sea.

“Maputo and New Hamburg, as well as the surrounding areas, formed a new province, the Hanseatic Province, with the provincial capital in New Hamburg.”

“In addition, a new Orange Province will be established in the South African region, with Bloemfontein as the provincial capital and including the city of Kimberley. The area basically overlaps with the original Orange Free State.”

“The province of Baden has made slight changes. The provincial capital is set in Gaborone, and the second largest city in the province is Upington.”

The geographical location of Baden Province is almost the southeast of Botswana in the former world and the northern British colony of Bechuanaland.

“In addition to adding the Central Province to the central region, with the city of Rhine as the national political center, the Province of Matabele was renamed the Province of Bohemia.”

This change in name actually emphasizes the industrial attributes of the province of Bohemia (northeast Zimbabwe). It is known that most of the industry of the Austro-Hungarian Empire is concentrated in the Bohemia region, so East Africa also uses this as a basis to refer to Bohemia. The province of Tarbele was renamed the province of Bohemia.

“At the same time, the city of Bulawayo was separated from the province of Bohemia and formed a new province of Lorraine with part of the western Kalahari Basin.”

This is for the purpose of checks and balances. The original Matabele Province was too strong, so it was split into two provinces in this regional adjustment. At the same time, it was also taken into consideration to take care of the Kalahari region.

The entire Kalahari Basin was part of the Lorraine Province, but there were no cities that could be invaded. The area was all desert and arid areas, so the annexation of Bulawayo City was a way to strengthen and stimulate the local area. .

“At the same time, the central province of Hesse was restructured into two provinces: Hesse and Mitumba.”

This is also the case of long-term division, long-term unity, and inevitable division. The original Hesse Province was the merger of Hesse Province and Mitumba Province. Now it has been split into two provinces again. The main reason is the development of the local economy.

"The Okavango Delta in the northern part of Lorraine Province, together with the northern plateau area, which is most of the eastern part of the former Letania Province, forms the Okavango Province, mainly for the comprehensive management of the Okavango River Basin." "South-West Africa forms the South-West Province, with the provincial capital in the city of Windhoek."

Southwest Africa has finally been established as a separate province and is the second largest provincial administrative region in East Africa, second only to the Congo Rainforest Reserve.

“In the west, the province of Letania, with Alexandria as its new provincial capital, is developing westward as a whole, and its area has been reduced due to the separation of Okavango Province.”

“With Benguela as the provincial capital, Benguela Province is established along the railway. With Luanda as the provincial capital, the West Coast Province is established along the railway.”

“The province of Congo is established along the Congo River in the north, including the cities of Cabinda and Kinshasa, with Kinshasa as the provincial capital.”

New Congo Province is basically distributed along the main stream of the lower reaches of the Congo River. At the same time, the main sea port is Cabinda, which also means that Brazzaville is gone. In the future, Kinshasa will be a city across the Congo River.

In the previous life, Brazzaville and Kinshasa were two cities formed due to colonial division. Now that East Africa has unified both sides of the Congo River, there is no need to set up two cities, especially after the Congo River railway bridge project was established.

“Main changes in the northern region, the province of Ubangi was established, and the provincial capital was set in the city of Bangui.”

It is basically a province established by the Ubangi River. It is also an important border province, bordering Sigmaringen, Cameroon (Germany), Gabon (France), and the Belgian Congo.

“At the same time, the eastern part of Ubangi Province was divided into two provinces, West Azande Province and East Azande Province. According to the Azande Plateau, the original Bavaria Province moved eastward to the west bank of Lake Königs (Lake Albert).”

In this way, the Azande Plateau and its surrounding areas have been transformed from two provinces into four provinces.

“The western and southern part of the Great Lakes region will be established as the Great Lakes Province, the northern part will remain the North Great Lakes Province, the northwest region will remain basically unchanged, the eastern part will be established as the Solon Lake Province, and the former Central Province will be changed to the Maritime Province.”

“Finally, the island of Madagascar was divided into the provinces of Mahajanga and Toliara.”

The administrative divisions of Madagascar are basically the same as those in the previous life. Ernst directly borrowed the names of these two provinces. At the same time, the areas and regions of the two provinces are basically the same as those in the previous life.

"The above are the changes in provincial administrative regions in East Africa. In addition, there are two special cities. However, they do not reach the level of provincial administrative regions, but they are higher than ordinary provincial capitals and prefecture-level cities, namely Dar es Salaam and Mongolia. Barcelona City, in the future, with the economic development of East Africa, the special city may be adjusted at any time.”

 Similar to the sub-provincial capital cities or municipalities of the previous Far Eastern Empire, but not as high as municipalities. After all, municipalities are provincial administrative regions, while the cities of Dar es Salaam and Mombasa still belong to the Coast Province (formerly Central Province) and Oriental Province.

This is a reflection of the economic strength of the two cities. However, with the development of other cities in the future, they may also be promoted to special municipalities, such as New Frankfurt, Beira, New Hamburg, Luanda, Cabinda, Mbe Asia City...are all on the candidate list.

In the end, there were 45 provincial administrative regions in East Africa, including Lanfang Overseas Province, two provinces on the island of Madagascar, and the Congo Rainforest Reserve. The cities of Dar es Salaam and Mombasa became special cities.

In March 1897, the latest data on the land of East Africa was also released. The land area of ​​East Africa was approximately 13,006,500 square kilometers, just over 13 million square kilometers. If calculated based on the area of ​​3020 (3022) square kilometers of Africa, it would account for exactly the entire continent. About 43 percent of the area.

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(End of this chapter)